With the Ulster Museum's new two-year exhibition now open, here are a few facts you might not know about the Elements

Mercury is the only metal that is liquid at room temperature, but it is a very nasty nerve-damaging poison. You can still buy 'quicksilver' medical thermometers today, but they use a mixture of gallium, indium and tin

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

Most elements in their pure form are grey metals of subtly different shades, and just looking at them says little about the unique properties of each. The densest of these cylinders, of molybdenum, weighs four times as much as the lightest, aluminium

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

Some of the rarest elements can be found on ink-pen nibs. Steel nibs are coated with gold, to resist corrosion, but they are sometimes tipped with hard-wearing metals, such as platinum, osmium and even iridium - the rarest non-radioactive element on Earth

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

Cadmium compounds have been used to make brilliant red, yellow and orange pigments for centuries. This is unfortunate for artists that have used them, since cadmium is a highly poisonous heavy metal that causes liver and kidney damage and, in high doses, death

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

The world would be a very different place without typemetal, and alloy of lead with tin and antimony. Its invention in 1450 was one of the most significant events in human history, revolutionising the spread of information

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

Some of the rarest elements can be found on ink-pen nibs. Steel nibs are coated with gold, to resist corrosion, but they are sometimes tipped with hard-wearing metals, such as platinum, osmium and even iridium, the rarest non-radioactive element on Earth

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

Chrome-plated 'bling' may be out of fashion for most people but chromium still plays a bigger role in modern fashion than you might think, since most shoe leather is tanned using chromium sulfate

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

This glass tube, removed from a professional flash lamp, looks empty but actually contains the inert gas element xenon. Passing an electric charge through the gas produces a brilliant flash, ideal for photography in dim light

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

Natural is not always best when it comes to cosmetics. Until barely a century ago ground-up minerals of lead, antimony or mercury were commonly used as make-up, sometimes resulting in skin ulceration and even premature death. Maria, Countess of Coventry, was perhaps the most famous 18th century "victim of cosmetics"

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

Mercury is the only metal that is liquid at room temperature, but it is a very nasty nerve-damaging poison. You can still buy 'quicksilver' medical thermometers today, but they don't contain mercury. They use a mixture of gallium, indium and tin that melts at -19C and is harmless

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

Most elements in their pure form are grey metals of subtly different shades, and just looking at them says little about the unique properties of each. The densest of these cylinders, of molybdenum, weighs four times as much as the lightest, aluminium. Can you recognise the others? Probably not – they all look too alike

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

Artists today are using metals and techniques more commonly found in specialised industries. This decorative plate is made from anodised niobium (a rocket-nozzle metal), vanadium (found in tough steel alloy spanners) and silver

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

Its neighbours on the Periodic Table are poisonous lead, mercury and polonium yet bismuth compounds are used in cosmetics and indigestion remedies without any ill effects

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

Cubic zirconia are brilliantly sparkly synthetic gemstones of zirconium oxide. Adding just a trace of another, often still more obscure element - such as europium, terbium or vanadium, adds beautiful tints to these gems

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Courtesy National Museums Northern Ireland

Elements: From Actinium to Zirconium is at the Ulster Museum until March 27 2016. Read our preview.

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